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Comments
@RedEyedAbyss if the "we make comics for 45-year olds" incident is any indication, major comic publishers alienate everyone outside of the middle-aged white male demographic.
There's some explanation of that here:
^^ re that quote: What about me? I don't agree with consumption in two senses.
First: in the sense of play-then-discard-and-forget -- I like to see games as enduring works of art which I prefer to appreciate more thoroughly and deeply than as throwaway toys for temporary amusement. I mean, if I'm gonna spend 20 hours playing something, shouldn't I expect something fulfilling from it?
Second: in the sense of acquiring more stuff. Be it games -- if you have more than 100~200 games, I really do question whether you have the time to appreciate all of them as much as you'd like (I sure as heck don't), even if you're able to afford all of them (which is easier these days thanks to digital distribution and sales) -- or be it peripherals/accessories/feelies/physical boxes/collectibles/etc., which I think say as much if not more about a person's wealth (and/or impulsiveness) than it does about how much they appreciate a game.
Granted, I'm probably in a minority since a ton of other people are flaunting their stuff (and doing so more loudly than my not flaunting anything), and the fact that the game industry is largely seen as a "business" rather than an "art" doesn't really help much.
Re pandering: I think, for gaming, the "ghetto demograhic" of school-age boys, tween boys, teen boys, and young men being pigeonholed as gamers is a thing that was perpetuated by both the videogame industry and by people outside the realm of videogaming stereotyping gamers. It became a positive feedback loop where it was at least likely to be socially advantageous for boys to identify (socially) as gamers while it was simultaneously likely to be socially advantages for everyone else to avoid doing the same, even if they did play games.
Part of this dispute over the term "gamer" has to do with whether it's a descriptor or an identity label. "Gamer" as a descriptor just means "someone who plays games", and I presume it is naturally favored by those people who feel that the videogaming (meta-?)community ought to be more inclusive, and is used to also describe people who might not be stereotypical "gamers" -- such as retirees playing Wii Sports. People like them are, on the other hand, unlikely to identify as "gamers" -- and the identity label sense of "gamer" has to do with what a person feels is most socially relevant about themselves. Obviously this varies with social context, but it's unlikely for people to choose an activity to identify with that they don't feel that much attachment or social relevance for.
So what a person means by the term "gamer" really does depend on the context and intention with which they use it.
Note that social context affects choice of labels (which in turn affects how much people feel that the labels define them). If you have boys hanging out with boys and they all think that playing videogames is cool, they're going to talk videogames more often, naturally.
That all said, I still think that firing people for listing "playing videogames" as a hobby is a stupid idea, as stupid as firing people who carry their laptop chargers in brown paper bags, for example.
@Naas, re anime fandom: I'd say "anime" is just one small step more specific than "gaming". Maybe it's comparable to, say, "the western game industry", but beyond that, it still contains a huge diversity of genres, setting types, intended audiences, and more.
Re mainstreaming of anime: I'd say gaming is further along than anime, in terms of becoming mainstream in first-world western/US culture. Videogames are have been a bigger thing for longer -- even despite the stereotypes about violent videogames and the pigeonholing of marketing toward a boys-and-young-men demographic -- and especially with the rise of casual games, they're increasingly seen as something relatable. Anime, on the other hand, despite a few high-profile successes in the west (such as Miyazaki movies) and the adoption of anime influence into some cartoons and live-action shows, is still largely seen as a niche interest in itself. That said, thanks largely to the internet making this more of a known thing lately, at least this niche is becoming more well-known.
Incidentally, I'd also like to observe that "gaming" is used to refer to a couple things other than just "playing videogames" -- there's non-video games, such as tabletop games (especially table-top role-playing games, whose players are more likely to use this term), and there's gambling/casinos/slot machines (especially common in municipal or state/province-level policy debates).
Re Spider-Man: They shold just multiple concurrent continuities. No reason they can't use the Zelda approach (before they started trying to stuff everything into a single timeline, of course).
Pretty sure it still counts as "consumption" even if you disagree with these specific aspects.
> Games: things from anywhere on earth (and beyond) can count as a game.
> Anime: must come from one island nation.
> small step
> Western world
> includes multiple continents, vast areas, actually a big chunk of the planet, probably billions of people
> Japan
> one island country
This feels like one of those cases where people think their interest is bigger than it actually is. Alternatively, why is Japan a "category" that somehow has "equal" standing with concepts like "the western world" when it's only one country?
What is Ultimate Marvel?
I said it was comparable because it's applying a medium filter (animation, or videogames) and then a geographic filter (Japan, or various western countries).
I did not mean to imply that it was comparable in size.
I'd say you have to consider how that compares on a cultural level, which the comparison doesn't work on unless you think Japan is somehow just as culturally diverse as the entire EU and the Americas combined, plus maybe a few other countries. And even disregarding that, I'm pretty sure anime has much lower diversity in other areas since there isn't as big an indie/amateur anime scene, so you're even more restricted by "what would get funded by production companies" with anime. Even in Japan doujin soft is a thing, but I don't hear about doujin animation being as much of a thing.
Also, taking size into account is probably important when you talk about how niche something is or isn't.
Fair enough, but I feel that even anime has a high enough degree of diversity that the western anime fandom feels to me like a collection of different interests barely held together by a few common causes, such as
You're right in that videogames have a far greater diversity than anime. Which just further makes the point that "gamer" is not much better of a defining identity marker than, say, "hat-wearer".
Except maybe to those people who don't play games (or don't wear hats).
@Jacobin Mag
>standard Adorno-style disdain for lowbrow culture, patronizing attitude towards the average Joe and utter ignorance of remix culture and piracy
Insufferable snobbery will guarantee that that brand of marxist will be the first on the chopping block once their revolution comes.
Speaking of marxism, /v/'s apparently freaking out about DIGRA and how they aim to promote leftish-academic sentiments in games, like it's the first art scene to sincerely believe their work to be a catalyst of social change and consisting of academics, promotors and the like who are all friends with each other. It's adorable.
On the other end of the aisle, look at the #NotYourShield hashtag on Twitter for some hilarious "whoops, you actually ARE a woman or PoC" foot-in-mouth hilarity.
This is a pretty common problem in these kinds of debates, I've noticed. People who speak up for marginalized groups tend to be very silent when actual marginalized people tell them they're wrong.
[user deleted]
"People who speak up for marginalized groups tend to be very silent when actual marginalized people tell them they're wrong."
From personal experience, this kind of sentiment is often invoked as a "My Asian friend isn't offended" excuse. Sure, white allies are often clueless, especially those that adhere to "colourblindness", but at least they are trying, and if that's what it takes for racism to actually get discussed, so be it. I've seen people talk over marginalized groups far, far more, and I don't need white guys telling me who to direct my antipathy towards.
It's a red herring to not actually engage with what's being said.
PoC says there are not offended and are turned off by the people using them as a prop for a moral crusade? Ha, all these people bringing up structural problems probably fall into the same category as the type of person PoC is complaining about(what other privileges does the PoC in question have that might soften that effect racist jokes have on them?).
PoC says that only whites can be racist? How dare you point out other historical examples, the fact that we already have 'institutional/systematic racism' for that, and the notion that you can't counter a dictionary fallacy with itself. This is tone policing/speaking over others' experiences, even though those derails don't even apply there.
And in the end, we get idiotic shenanigans like people quoting rich black celebrities like authorities on the experiences of a diverse group and clowns claiming logic is an oppressive concept. People don't engage with what's being said(or take people's refusal to engage as a sign that they are automatically right).
Then there's the people saying that women who support video games and gamers are no different than "house niggers" during slavery (these are literally the exact words she uses), or people saying that it's totally justified to doxx and send death threats to a ten year old boy.
The first is a /pol/ account/(look at the chan pic avatar and the 'gay men are misogynist' further down). The latter, however, is seriously creepy: https://bigotwatcher.wordpress.com/ (never mind the one-off attack blog nature of this site, the tweets speak for themselves)
Fuck, are the neo-nazis in /pol/ getting involved in this now? Well that sure isn't going to make things worse at all.
They were involved from the start(the altright is also glued to the intertubes). Any SJW twitter shitstorm is an opportunity for deep-cover bait accounts to gain credibility: https://i.imgur.com/QOzeuZ0.png ;
And the segment of /pol/ that's not in it for the trolling sees it as the next leg of Cultural Marxism(tm). *insert speculation on the testosterone levels of hipsterbeards here*
[user deleted]
You can keep up with the doomsaying if you want, but as long as you do I'll keep mocking it and keep doing what I can to promote a positive community.
[user deleted]
I've been thinking about this, and I kind of agree, honestly. It's not out of spite or anything; I just don't really personally identify with the culture as a whole even though I play some fringe things.
Also, I haven't been on IJBM in a year. Heyoooo.
Let's make an over-the-top game about killing gamers, and then donate all the surplus money to Child's Play or some other charity SJWs would hate.
^ Close enough?
[citation needed]
Also, "SJW" has become the new "liberal". Once again, I state that much of the sexism complaints come from video game players themselves, so this "us vs them" mentality is stupid.
I have actually become fatigued with gamer culture over a long time. The current events were just the straw that broke the camel's back, and people screaming like Nicolas Cage in The Wicker Man give me less reason to go back to the label.
I'd actually used to consider myself an "anti-SJW" until I'd realized that most, if not all of the people who considered themselves such acted exactly the same as the people they hated so much.
My take on SJWs is that, even if they're annoying, at least they have a principle behind their being annoying. Haters, on the other hand, just feel like hating on them.
It is kinda interesting to see how the two sides are kinda analogous to the liberal/conservative divide. There's many facets of that divide, but this conflict mirrors the "others' lives aren't good yet" vs. "life is fine, shut up" facet.
^^Add recycling the same jokes("lol x tears" vs. "as a-kin...") constantly, shooting down largely okay stuff over small details and seeing the secret hand of the opposite side's influence in everything.
Anyhow, Child's Play is operated in part by the Penny Arcade dudes of the Dickwolves controversy fame, there are bound to be keyboard warriors who will take umbrage with them and their charity a step further than the established standard: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/09/19/to-boycott-pax-or-not-to-boycott-pax/
"One of the co-creators is tainted=charity is spoiled 4ever" falls firmly within the spectrum of radicals on both sides(I wouldn't surprise me in the least if an anti-SJW refused to donate to an otherwise good cause because of one of the board members was being an obnoxious hashtag activist on Twitter).
^Also, accepting a superficial coating of words as principle while actions run counter to them is not admirable in any way, shape or form. Intent isn't magic, as they say, and a rigid framework of morals is absolutely worthless if it falls apart when reality comes crashing down(take the clowns who go from bashing overvaluation of romantic achievement with dudettes in society to mocking others for being foreveralone in the same hour).
So this has appeared.:
http://pastebin.com/ZJFkSz2K
A tweet I saw pointed out how ridiculously contradictory the "To the Suppliers, the Press, the Trusted Informers" section is, so maybe one of the editors was a troll.
If what @InsansityAddict said earlier is true, then I think at this point most of the REALLY awful shit has come from /pol/ or possibly /b/.
The whole thing started with really awful shit coming from /v/. Now that they've realized the "other side" is watching 4chan they're trying to act like they're above it all, yes.
How do you tell which boards these people are from when they're outside 4chan itself?
It's also possible for people to have more then one homeboard at the same time. And subribbits, the altright sphere(hello Milo) and the occassional badly moderated message board also feeds into it.